Experimental Study of a Heat Pump for Simultaneous Cooling and Desalination by Membrane Distillation

Ahmadou Tidiane Diaby (1, 2) , Paul Byrne (2) , Patrick Loulergue (3) , Ousmane Sow (4) , Thierry Maré (2)

1 Lafset - Laboratoire du froid et des systèmes énergétiques et thermiques
2 LGCGM - Laboratoire de Génie Civil et Génie Mécanique
3 ISCR - Institut des Sciences Chimiques de Rennes
4 UCAD - Université Cheikh Anta Diop de Dakar [Sénégal]

Heat pump systems can simultaneously produce cooling energy for space cooling in hotels, office and residential buildings and heat for desalination using membrane distillation (MD). The MD technique uses a heat input at a temperature compatible with the levels of heat pump condensers (<60 °C). A heat pump prototype coupled with an air-gap membrane distillation unit was constructed and tested. This paper presents the experimental study on a lab-scale prototype and details the two operating modes "continuous" and "controlled" simulating an air conditioning system and a food storage, respectively. The experimental results enable to analyze the performance of the prototype and the physical phenomena involved. Finally, the study shows that this system could be a promising solution to help supplying freshwater to people in hot regions of the world.

Mots clés: cooling; desalination; heating; membrane distillation; simultaneous demand

Domaines: Chimie

Ahmadou Tidiane Diaby, Paul Byrne, Patrick Loulergue, Ousmane Sow, Thierry Maré. Experimental Study of a Heat Pump for Simultaneous Cooling and Desalination by Membrane Distillation. Membranes, 2021, 11 (10), pp.1-22. ⟨10.3390/membranes11100725⟩. ⟨hal-03414760⟩